No bail for the man accused of beating and repeatedly raping Millicent Gaika

No bail for the man accused of beating and repeatedly raping Millicent Gaika for five hours because she is a lesbian. This was the demand made by Luleki Sizwe LBT Womyn’s Project when they turned up in full force at the Magistrates Court Tuesday, 6 April 2010. More than 80 people from Gugulethu, Khayalitsha and Nyanga arrived in protest at the Wynberg court on Tuesday, 6 April in anger and solidarity. However, the hearing was postponed to Tuesday 13th March and the man has been kept in custody.

Millicent explained that she and her friends were walking home after visiting another friend. The man, whom she said she had known for a number of years and who had never objected to her sexuality before, asked her for a cigarette. She stayed to smoke with him, and followed him into his room when he refused to pass the cigarette to her. According to her he then locked the door and started hitting her while she tried to fight back.

“He pulled off my clothes and pushed me down on the bed. He was holding me down, strangling me with the wire and pushing his hands hard onto my neck. She added that he threatened to kill her and throw her body in the river I thought I was gonna die[Millicent]. He kept saying to her, “I know you are a lesbian. You are not a man. You think you are, but I am going to show you are a woman.”I’m gonna make you pregnant you are going to carry a babe for me .I really hate myself right now Andile has killed me big time. I really hate man honestly why me why me.

[…] who was killed in April 2007, Alexandra township. There are unfortunate cases like those of Millicent Gaika, survivor of curative rape that happened in April 2010, Gugulethu. Gaika became the face of […]